By Amalia Oulahan
Sorry, Atlanta. Forbes ranked America’s most toxic cities, and you are number one. But Chicago isn’t far behind, tied for third with Houston. Detroit took second place.
Forbes' list includes the number of facilities releasing toxic chemicals, the pounds of toxic chemicals being released, air quality and the number of U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Superfund sites in each city (read: areas that need to be cleaned).
Chicago is the leader in two of the four categories, having the most toxic facilities and the most sites needing remediation. According to Forbes’ report, Chicago has the most facilities releasing toxic chemicals nationwide, 773. No other city comes close. The next highest is Los Angeles with 480 facilities.
Chicago is the leading city when it comes to the most toxic sites that need to get cleaned up, with 104. That’s five more than Los Angeles, which came in second and covers twice as many square miles.
The Chicago Reporter covered our local toxic neighbors last fall. See our story to learn more about the reasons we’re near the top of this noxious list.
Also, see this Huffington Post report.
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